The US Embassy in India has taken a keen interest in ‘fighting disinformation’ and ‘hate speech’, conducting multiple workshops through its consulates and mission. However, the manner and the individuals engaged, raise some questions.
A thread
Starting about 2019, the US Embassy in India and its Consulate – all started workshops on “counter disinformation” across India – Kolkata, Lucknow, Hyderabad, Chennai, and Mumbai.
But what kind of #Disinformation? And who conducted these workshops?
A workshop in Lucknow in 2019 was conducted by a ‘disinformation expert’ named Tina Lee. Incidentally, the workshop was against ‘far-right disinformation’ – and Ms Lee is a self-proclaimed ‘far-left’ activist!
As to how ‘reliable’ she’d be as an expert? She’s very ‘liberal’ in calling political opponents ‘Fascists’. Could US taxpayers’ money be used on such partisan individuals?
That’s not all. This ‘counter disinformation’ expert was also found spreading #fakenews –literally.
The US offices in Delhi and Kolkata invited an expert Ms Brittani Kollar for similar workshops. There were allegations of norm violations by US Missions, including visa norms. Whatever the trigger, the US Embassy was forced to delete the tweet promoting her.
Kollar is the deputy Director of Mediawise, a Poynter’s project, and Poynter is funded by Omidyar (!) WaPo (!) and Open Society Foundations (!). After the expose, Ms. Kollar first locked and later deleted her profile altogether!
#InformationResilience #Transparency
Kollar’s was not a lone case, though it got famous. Earlier, a similar ‘workshop’ was organized by the US Office in Hyderabad in association with Osmania University – trained by Alanna Dvorak, International Training Manager with IFCN- another Poynter-funded enterprise.
The US Consulate in Hyderabad has also been funding to the tune of USD 100,000 to USD 175,000 (INR 80-L to 1.5 Cr) for ‘countering disinformation’ – (the same US Style?) – in Tamil, Telugu, Marathi, Bengali, and Hindi.
However, these ‘counter disinformation’ initiatives are not problematic in particular, unless one sees what’s happening in the West, particularly in the US in the name of ‘countering disinformation’ – the industrial scale censorship against free speech.
The US administration that is so keen in fighting #disinformation in India has itself been involved in censoring #FreeSpeech and indulging in information manipulation at a global scale and at an unprecedented level in history!
How does one square the circle?!
We are not claiming this.
The US House Committee on Weaponization of Federal Government, that is documenting the #censorship in media and social media by the US Administration, says so.
(that there was a need for such a committee itself is a story)
On May 1, 2024, the Weaponization Committee published a 98-page report – documenting how the US Govt is censoring all social media and beyond – and the biggest censorship is affected through Facebook.
A multi-year multi-level censorship.
There are evidences of secret communication between FBI/ CIA and Facebook (FB) – a backdoor information manipulation that should not have happened in any democracy.
Contd.
And while the committee is only documenting censorship of political opponents, it has global ramifications – covering topics like #Covid_19, etc., Countries like India have NO SAY whatsoever.
FB wasn’t alone
The story is same for #Google, #YouTube & likely #Instagram. Google Docs show they worked on ‘multiple policy fronts’ with Biden administration- SECRETLY.
(Incidentally, there are many reports from India of arbitrary implementation of censorship by YouTube.)
Everyone would have heard of
#TwitterFiles
–internal Twitter communication revealed by
#ElonMusk
– which documented how the US Govt agencies-
#DHS
#FBI
#CIA
etc. had been running the
#censorship
industry from within Twitter– in collusion with Twitter senior functionaries.
Remember former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey– who scoffed at ‘Indian Democracy’ because govt had asked Twitter to withhold some handles. Yes, it was under the same
“clown”
that the US Govt was running its censorship – and it didn’t affect democracy!
The censorship goes far beyond social media.
The manipulation is at all levels and through all platforms. #Biden #WhiteHouse forced #Amazon to selectively promote (or not) certain kinds of books or literature.
You’ll have all the freedom of speech– but it’d reach nowhere.
Manipulation of #Wikipedia is also well discussed– reports say FBI has been ‘editing’ Wiki pages since 2008. Its co-founder Larry Sanger calls it most bias encyclopaedia. Other co-founder Jimmy Wales has been co-opted by the ‘censorship regime’.
h/t @mikeBenzCyber
To what extent does the censorship indeed go?! Till Reddit.
Who would have thought that the ‘free-spirited’ discussion platform for nerds would also be manipulated? But of course. And if any doubts, venerable #WaPo clears it by ‘recommending’ it.
Therefore, you would forgive us for not being mighty convinced that the US missions in India have suddenly developed passion against disinformation – and liberally throwing US taxpayers’ money for the benefit of Indians?!
And if not, then what is it?
The answer might be in the organization that has been engaged by US Embassy for the ‘counter-disinformation’ theater – it’s called the International Research and Exchange Board (IREX) – founded by the Ford Foundation.
The organization is headed by Kristin M Lord, who had been associated with several ‘non-government’ organizations – USIP, USAID, and CFR. Interestingly, IREX is funded, amongst the long list of donors by #Soros.
Such a small world.
IREX Global Advisor is Paige Alexander – who has also worked with USAID etc. Her spouse, Steve Grand is also from the world of non-govt-non-profits – and is an expert on Spring Revolution. He has worked in the past with Atlantic Council as well.
#IYKYK
.
IREX, the non-govt, has many luminaries as office bearers from various parts of the US Govt. IREX leadership over the years had been led by people associated with USAID/ NED and so forth. IREX is also funded by a lot many US embassies around the world.
In other words, US govt entities (Embassies and consulates) are engaging the non-govt (IREX – almost enterally peopled with former US govt) – which in turn are funded by other US Govt entities (US Embassies from Israel to Pakistan).
Hope there is no money laundering trail there. We won’t know. What we do know is, with all taxpayers’ money, all govt and non-govt is engaging is only a particular type of people – seeped in a particular ideology.
A side note: The IREX website has all members’ details –except two – GP & JI. Not saying there is something, but..
So, if the enterprise is not for the love of India – what is it?
The War on Disinformation is the new #WarOnTerror – a foreign policy tool run through a global machinery – to manage, manipulate, stabilize, or destabilize governments, societies, and countries.
To quote from Jacob Siegel’s “a Guide to Understanding the Hoax of the Century”:
The crux of ‘war against disinformation’ is: don’t trust your govt; don’t trust your institutions; don’t even trust your own eyes and ears. You will be TOLD what to believe – by the custodians of ‘real information’.
They way you were told about the news on Trump.
George Orwell thought that it would be a communist/ socialist system that would descend into a dystopian regime. He would have never believed that the capitalist heaven of the US would create the most advanced techno-censorship dystopia.
These are not mere rhetoric– these are visible on the ground. What started at Spring Revolution, graduated into Color Revolution – has been perfected into a fine art of regime change – to be applied with friends and foes alike.
And they have descended on India
Don’t believe us? Listen to the ‘prophets of democracy’ – who have decided that democracy will no longer be decided by votes, elections, or parliament. Under the ‘new religion’ – democracy will be decided on street – through anarchy.
The architects of this dystopian censorship and masters of spring and colour revolutions have put their benevolent eyes on India.
Not sure, if spring is coming, or winter is coming. Or a winter of spring.
